Flavio Briatore legal challenge to FIA ban

Flavio Briatore is launching legal action to get his lifetime ban overturned

Flavio Briatore will start legal proceedings in the Paris Tribunal de Grande tomorrow in an attempt to overturn the lifetime ban he received from the FIA for his part in the ‘Singapore-Gate’ race fixing episode, which saw Nelson Piquet Jnr intentionally crashing his car to allow team mate Fernando Alonso to take victory in the 2008 Singapore Grand Prix.

Briatore is claiming the life time ban from involvement in any FIA sanctioned Motor Sport – including driver management – is a legal absurdity. And he probably has a point. There must be innumerable EU laws covering restraint of trade and umpteen other arguments to support his case.

Appalling though the incident was, it has to be untenable to impose a sentence that has no end. There are also questions surrounding immunities the FIA gave out to those giving evidence.

The outline of the legal case is:

The FIA’s deliberate breach of the rights of the defence FIA including

Breach of the rules of natural justice including

The FIA’s manifest excess and abuse of power including

Flavio Briatore intends to obtain an Order from the Court quashing the FIA’s decision insofar as it relates to him, together with an Order, subject to a penalty for non-compliance, requiring the Federation to withdraw any penalty imposed on him.

Should be an interesting battle.

Source: Crash.Net

By Cars UK